To the editor:
The recent “Will he/Won’t he?” discussion about Sheriff Borkovich’s possible collaboration with ICE officials rightly puts the focus on Leelanau County’s local law enforcement, but it implicitly raises another related question: What about the rest of us?
In 1850, the US Congress passed a renewed Fugitive Slave Act that created draconian dangers for people escaping from slavery, including the requirement that local citizens assist in their capture and return to bondage. Many Michiganders, white and Black, refused to cooperate, creating a series of safe spaces on the Underground Railroad, and common citizens offered shelter and support, and sometimes even outright physical resistance, in defense of freedom-seekers. They succeeded in saving hundreds.
Now, 175 years later, we face a potentially similar challenge. Immigrants in our region, most of whom have come here legally to do crucial work for the local farm economy, live with the fearful prospect of being rounded up and sent away—not to slavery in the South this time, but to incarceration even further south, particularly given Donald Trump’s prison plans for Guantanamo and El Salvador. We don’t yet know, of course, whether or when that nightmare will become a local reality, but we need to be aware and prepared. We need to think what we — as individuals, congregations, or organizations — can do to provide assistance and, if needed, resistance.
Leelanau County has long been called the “Little Finger” of Michigan. We now have the opportunity, even obligation, to become the Middle Finger to Trump’s pernicious policies.
Gregory Nobles Northport
